‘I was forced to move from my beloved family farm for HS2 – eight years later it’s in wrack and ruin’

A farmer and his family forced to move from their beloved Georgian farmhouse and close their award-winning shop and wedding venue to make way for HS2 say they are dismayed that eight years on, not a single line of track has been built.

John and Rosemary Barnes were the third generation of family to live at Packington Moor Farm near Lichfield in Staffordshire when high speed rail plans were unveiled to connect Birmingham and London to the north of England.

Facing uncertainty for their on-site wedding venue, they felt they had no other choice but to sell the farm to HS2 with its 250 acres of land and popular farm shop, resulting in the loss of 40 jobs.

The family then bought a new farm in Cheltenham, but could not secure planning permission to move the wedding business.

Today, eight years after vacating the farm, Mr Barnes said he felt depressed to see his former home, with once-terraced gardens designed by local gentry, fall into wrack and ruin, while not a section of railway track has been laid.

The farm sits on the Birmingham to Staffordshire section of HS2, which will not to open until at least 2040 with work currently paused to focus on the London to Birmingham stretch of the beleaguered project.

HS2 told The Independent that most of the buildings at the farm had been demolished for construction work, and that it could not rent out remaining buildings because they had been cut off from utility services.

But the old farmhouse, taken over by Mr Barnes’ family in 1921, still stands with tin sheets over its windows and boarded-up doors.

“It’s just a depressing mess that hasn’t been looked after at all,” said the 72-year-old. “When we moved we were saddened to go but felt we were doing it for the greater good, but the greater good has not happened and you begin to wonder if it ever will in all honesty.

“I see the house, my brother who still lives up there tells me about it, and it looks awful. I just don’t like to see it run down like it is now when it was a family home for so long. Why couldn’t they have kept the connections in and have a family in there today with no work taking place?

“It’s either going to tumble down or somebody will set fire to it.”

The three-storey home with six bedrooms was once part of the estate owned by the Levett family, who also owned nearby Packington Hall. Passed on to the Barnes’ family, it was then used to rear poultry, pigs and to grow potatoes.

In 1986, the farm shop opened, later winning several local food and drink awards. A wedding venue followed with expansion into a barn built in 2000, with more than 700 ceremonies performed until its closure.

But with plans for the HS2 line, the family served a blight notice – which allows property owners to compel a public authority to buy their property before a compulsory purchase order is executed – which led to the farm being purchased by HS2 on behalf of the government. They initially rented back 200 acres of the land for farming, but stopped last year after an increase in rents became unviable.

Last year, The Independent revealed that out of 1,475 homes purchased to make way for HS2, 27 per cent still lay empty. It included Rachel Halvorsen’s former 10-bedroom home in Brackley, which she sold to HS2 for £4m. Stanthorne Hall near Middlewich in Cheshire, bought by HS2 for £3.8m in 2023, also sits empty.

HS2 has previously said that some properties are not rented out due to the cost of bringing them up to a “lettable standard”.

Mr Barnes said: “There’s no sympathy in it, no feeling for people they have impacted. Once you are gone, you are gone and you become just a number. The fact you’ve been there for so long doesn’t really count for anything.”

He added: “It’s been a scandal from the start, a complete joke and a farce. One hand doesn’t know what the other hand is doing. In a way, we’re the lucky ones to get out while many living up there still are in limbo over it all.”

A spokesperson for HS2 said: “Work on the section of HS2 between Birmingham and the connection with the West Coast Main Line at Handsacre [Staffordshire] is largely paused, as we focus on opening the section of the railway between Curzon Street [Birmingham] and Old Oak Common [west London].

“Most of the buildings at Packington Moor Farm have been demolished to facilitate our works, and utilities and services have also been severed. We assessed the rental potential for the remaining buildings, but as they are so close to our construction site, and no longer connected to the network, this simply isn’t viable.”

In May, transport secretary Heidi Alexander ruled a line on an “era of neglect” on HS2 as she set out plans to reset the project, which is now expected to cost up to £103bn and have slower trains operating on them.

The first section of the line from Old Oak Common in West London to Birmingham is expected to open from between 2036 and 2039, followed by the section to Staffordshire, connecting HS2 to the West Coast Main Line, between 2040 and 2043.

Ms Alexander said: “Taxpayers, passengers and communities along the route have been let down by years of mismanagement on HS2... I share their anger about the waste and mess.”